


A myth to live by

by Snap_crackle_spock



Series: A myth to live by [2]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: AU where Ahsoka knows Anakin's Vader and instead of feeling guilt about it she's fuckin pissed, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Sequel to 'Til There's Nothing Left, a bitch is sad guys, anyway this might end up being a fix-it fic we'll see where it takes me., lots and lots of angst
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-12
Updated: 2020-12-13
Packaged: 2021-03-05 20:53:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 14,343
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25861630
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Snap_crackle_spock/pseuds/Snap_crackle_spock
Summary: "The cloak she wore was dark brown. The color of the robes of a long-ago Jedi. The color of Padme’s hair, splayed out beneath her as her corpse was marched through the Naboo streets like a general on their way to war. The color of charred and burning skin, flaking off onto Mustafar’s magmatic soil.This was not a glamorous color, but Ahsoka Tano did not lead a glamorous life."---Canon divergence where Ahsoka knows(tm)
Relationships: Anakin Skywalker & Ahsoka Tano
Series: A myth to live by [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1876624
Comments: 4
Kudos: 23





	1. Part One

**Author's Note:**

> This is a sequel to a one-shot I️ wrote earlier called "'Til there's nothing left". You don't //have to read it// to understand what's going on, just know that it's a canon divergence from the end of the Mandalore Plot arc/ RotS, where Ahsoka travels to Mustafar after beating Maul instead of going back to Coruscant, and she witnesses basically that entire fight.

_You think that I need you_

_More than you need me._

_Well there's no way that_

_I'm gonna give up so easy._

_'Cause I've waited too long_

_For my life future to slip by_

_And my life is gonna be_

_A myth to live by_

_\- Myth to Live By (Lizard Boy)_

* * *

The cloak she wore was dark brown. The color of the robes of a long-ago Jedi. The color of Padme’s hair, splayed out beneath her as her corpse was marched through the Naboo streets like a general on their way to war. The color of charred and burning skin, flaking off onto Mustafar’s magmatic soil. 

This was not a glamorous color, but Ahsoka Tano did not lead a glamorous life. Years ago, she would’ve said the same thing, but looking back she should’ve recognized her royalty status while it was happening. To think, she’s conflated drab colors and humble rooms with the life of the common folk. As if she didn’t live in a stone palace, at the top of the highest hill. The Jedi were fools to think this way, to teach _her_ to think this way. The real citizens of Coruscant could see through this facade like looking to the bottom of a crystalline lake, shallow after all. 

If she could have seen this future where she found herself wandering from Outer Rim planet to Outer Rim planet, doing everything she could to remain anonymous, she would’ve realized that living on the highest ledge of the Coruscant hierarchy was a blessing that so few had ever been privy to. 

“Ashla!” a shrill voice called out from beneath her. Quick as a whip, a little boy wound his way between her legs, taking the tail ends of her brown cloak and hanging it upon his head, mirroring the way it draped over hers. “Mama said you aren’t coming to dinner tonight.”

Ahsoka bent down, causing the fabric to slide off his head, though his eyes stayed wide as she closed in. Bett was a cute kid, one that reminded her of the Younglings she’d accompanied to Ilum so many years ago. He was hopeful and happy and so full of kindness. Ahsoka envied him for it. 

“I’m not staying. Your mom owes me some money, then I’m heading out.”

64 credits, to be exact. Making her grand total of savings a meager 139. She’d lived away from the Jedi for a year before everything truly terrible had happened, but even that couldn’t have prepared her for how difficult living odd-job to odd-job would be. Especially when you had to pay for frequent transportation between planets. 

But that was the way of the Jedi, now. Or, ex-Jedi. Though she’d been “ex” for longer than the rest. If there even were any others. She’d seen Obi-Wan leave… but she had no idea how far he’d made it; if he was even still alive. And she had _no_ idea how many others had managed to escape. 

Her senses had been clouded as she’d traveled to Mustafar, consumed with her desperation to find and help and fix Anakin, which would eventually turn out to _not_ be the case, but she’d felt the faint pulls of a massacre. This had only been confirmed by the quick-reaching propaganda of Palpatine working to rewrite history, praising the execution of the Jedi in the fated Order 66. 

Ahsoka didn’t want to think of what that meant of Rex, Cody, any of the thousands of brothers she’d forged bonds within the midst of battle. 

These were the things that kept her up at night. The thoughts that plagued her as she waited at docking bays, anticipating the arrival of ships to take her between worlds. The ones that hummed at the forefront of her mind whenever clones marched past, hands on their weapons, and on the hunt. 

They didn’t wear their own colors, anymore. All now compiled into a sea of snowy white, which had quickly come to be the color of a merciless death. Even if Ahsoka was brave enough to try to scrutinize them more closely, there was nothing there. No longer any tells, physical or mental, on who was under the masks. She didn’t know how the Senate had so quickly wiped them of everything (memory, personality, love) but there was nothing left to be found, no loose threads left to pull on. 

Ahsoka had stayed briefly on Ossus, a dry and sad planet, where she’d run into one of the clones, by himself on a patrol. This was before everything had been real to her. She’d approached cautiously, careful to not start a chain reaction of calls to his commander, but as gently as she could, she reached through the Force to try to brush by, see if she knew him. 

Ahsoka had never encountered a being with no Force signature before. Even those who she couldn’t read were just hidden behind walls. She couldn’t sense droids because they were inanimate and therefore not one with the living Force. But this was a living, breathing creature –a person– without anything for Ahsoka to latch onto. 

But he’d noticed. 

There hadn’t been any hesitation when he’d pulled his blaster on her. 

It was the first time someone had drawn a weapon on her since Maul and Anakin and everything going to hell. On instinct, she’d reached to her hip for her sabers, only to remember that they were somewhere on Mustafar, simmering in a river of lava. It was only years and years of training that had kept her alive. Four shots flew by her as she vaulted over the clone, coming up behind him and winding his arms through her own to halt his movements. As best she could, she shoved him forward, her knee on his back to pin him to the sand beneath them. 

“Which legion are you a part of?” She begged, desperate for something she could use to make him stop, “which Jedi did you serve under?”

“I don’t serve under any Jedi,” He shouted, and it sounded like Rex. Like Oddball, like Fives, like Hevy, Echo, Cody, and Dogma, “Their traitors and cowards.”

 _Yes._ _No. Things aren’t so simple._ Why was everyone always trying to make definitive statements? Why couldn’t they see that things weren’t so cut and dry, so red versus blue? 

_The Jedi are cowards. And_ **_traitors_ ** . _They deserve to rot._

Ahsoka could remember those words spilling out of Anakin’s mouth like they’d burned him. He’d believed them, too. Everyone seemed to be so willing to believe this half-truth. 

The clone beneath her kept moving. She wouldn’t be able to hold him forever. She was strong, stronger than most people would assume, but she’d never been one to rely on brute strength. He would overpower her, eventually, and would run and find help or try to shoot her again, to which she had no defense. There was only one way she was surviving this encounter. 

It didn’t mean it didn’t hurt. 

She didn’t close her eyes. She’d killed before, this should be no different. It was more dangerous to look away. She dug her knee further into his back, released her left hand, and held it up to summon the blaster that lay next to them in the sand. She hadn’t used the Force in such a way since Mustafar, and if felt warm and dangerous. 

For a second, she considered setting the blaster to stun. It was what she wished she could do, leave this man who didn’t remember that he was family breathing for another day. 

But she’d heard about the execution of the Jedi. She knew a dead clone could mean anything, but one who could identify her was dangerous. A clone that could tell the entire Grand Army of the Republic that Ahsoka Tano was still alive would cause far more damage than the blaster in her hand. 

So it hurt Ahsoka to press the barrel of the blaster to the back of his helmet as he writhed beneath her, but she did it anyway. She leaned on the training she’d endured for years that told her to cast aside her emotions and do what needed to be done. 

“I’m sorry,” she said, and reasoned that at least she was giving him a swift death. 

“Traitor.” Was all he spat before putting his head down and taking it with honor. 

The brief flash of blue was a stark contrast to the oranges and yellows of the planet, and as soon as the deed had been done, she threw aside the blaster and got up to roll him over onto his back. 

When she took off his helmet, yellow marks were adorning each cheek. Bly. He’d fought in Aayla’s legion. 

Ahsoka would never admit it, but she cried harder than she ever had that day. She wept as she hauled his body over her shoulders and took him to a small spot that was shaded by one of the large rocks that dotted the planet. She wept as she lay him down and turned to use the Force to lift the sand in order to make a hole for him, one that was deep and respectful. She wept as she lifted him in, then moved the sand back over and hid him from the world. She wept as she placed his helmet at the head of the grave, guarded by rocks all around to keep wild creatures from ruining his final place of rest. 

Ahsoka did not cry after, though. She wiped away her tears as she stood up, and remained stoic as she turned and continued walking. When she bent down to pick up the rifle, she felt a twinge of guilt, but she did not let it overcome her.

“Ashla!” A voice called, pulling her from her memories. She looked down and saw Bett, still staring up at her with his big, hopeful eyes. He’d grabbed her cloak again, this time pulling on it hard to get her attention. It shifted from its position on her shoulders, and just like that the blaster at her hip was exposed. 

It wasn’t a crazy concept for people to carry weapons with them. A half-decent blaster was a dime a dozen these days. But Ahsoka was on a small satellite in the middle of the Outer Rim, and her blaster was an Empire model. It was an easy thing to get noticed for. 

Hastily, she straightened her cloak, just as Bett’s mom made her way up the dirt path towards them. She was the spitting image of her son, the same wide brown eyes and bouncy black hair. The same sunned warmth of farmers and inner glow of kindness. 

“Bett, stop terrorizing her,” his mother, Mara, chided. Like the scolded child he was, he slunk back from Ahsoka and retreated into his mother’s embrace. She scooped him up with a smile before looking to Ahsoka, “The offer for dinner still stands.”

Mara was a good woman. Her husband had been killed during the Clone Wars and she’d been left to deal with their three children alone, which she had done without complaint or issue. The farm they resided on was the only one for miles, so they made their money at local markets and with the sparse intergalactic trade that happened on the other side of the Satellite. When Ahsoka had first arrived here, she’d bought a handful of fruits for Mara at the market, and she’d asked where Ahsoka was going. 

_“How do you know I’m not just coming to live here for the rest of my life?”_

_“Nobody comes here to live, dear.”_

It had been the first truly nice thing someone had said to Ahsoka since she’d last seen Rex. The second was when Mara had offered her a place at her dinner table that evening. 

_“I’m sure it’d be more trouble than I’m worth-”_

_“Don’t even say that. A cold meal in a lonely house is no way to start the rest of your life.”_

Her other kids, Brina and Aven, were sweet, but Bett had been the one that had immediately taken a shining to Ahsoka, the one that had followed her to the barn when she’d offered to take a look at their machinery as thanks for the meal. 

_“Is that what you do then, Ashla?” Mara had asked, leaning against the wooden doors and using the name Ahsoka had passed off as her own, “Fix things?”_

Ahsoka said yes because it was easy, but if she was honest she couldn’t recall a single thing she’d fixed. Everywhere she went, all she did was break things. Years of teamwork, promise after promise, trust. Maybe once she would have agreed, but now she was more of a hammer than glue. 

“I shouldn’t,” Ahsoka sighed, genuine remorse in her voice, “I don’t want to miss the shuttle.” Ships only came every so often, and the only port was on the other side of the satellite. It would take her hours to get there, even on a speeder. She couldn’t afford to miss another one. She’d already let herself stay too long. 

“Mama says you’re leaving!” Bett accused, his tiny hands buried deeply into Mara’s curls. The satellite they were on had four suns, one in each direction. It made it unbearably hot most days, but it also caused moments like this to shine. It caused the little freckles on Bett’s nose to look like they were laid on with gold foil. 

Ahsoka held herself back from going to comfort the boy. He looked so unashamed in his upset nature, so sad at the prospect of her leaving. Ahsoka could remember the last time someone had been so sad to see her go. It caused a hole to form in her stomach the size of a planet. 

But she’d learned to walk away. She’d learned that lesson over and _over and_ **_over again._ ** The trick, she’d learned, was not letting yourself pick and choose what you get to leave behind. Because that’s when things start going to shit. 

She’d thought she could go back. She thought she would be able to cherry-pick people from her old life and bring them with her into her new one. The universe doesn’t work like that. It turns out that they’re either liars or victims or just shells of their former selves, hollow and cold. 

He’d been so cruel. He’d yelled such angry words at her as she left him burning. She didn’t want them to, but sometimes they would echo through her head and she’d be reminded that nothing good can ever last. 

She had to learn that lesson the hardest way possible. She would not repeat her mistakes. 

With this in mind, she steeled herself the way a good Jedi would, hardening herself against the prospect of a life like Mara and Bett’s, quaint and inconsequential and content and quiet. She had to keep moving. 

“Sorry, kiddo. Even your mom’s delicious cooking isn’t going to make me miss my ship a second time.”

With a pout, Bett wiggled his way out of Mara’s arms, landing on the ground in a crouch and dashing over to hug Ahsoka’s legs, a moment she wasn’t ready for. 

She’d never been great at dealing with kids. The last time she’d had to watch a group of them, she’d been separated and taken hostage by pirates. And even before that, she’d only really been able to talk to them as a Padawan to a group of Younglings, not as a teenager to a group of nine-year-olds. So when Ahsoka put a hand on Bett’s shoulder, it was stiff and awkward, but she tried her best to make it known that it was a loving thing. 

In the folds of her loose pants, she heard him whisper, “If you let me come with you I won’t tell my mom.”

She let out a small laugh at that, before bending down to her knees to look him in his wide eyes, swimming with possibility. 

“Maybe next time, when you’re older.”

Taking this as a ‘maybe’ as opposed to the ‘no’ it was, Bett grinned and ran one of his so-small hands over her montral. Not a lot of Togrutas passing through these parts, she supposed. 

“Betten,” Mara called after giving them a moment, gentle as ever, “why don’t you run to the house and go grab Ashla some food for her trip. If she won’t stay for dinner, she might as well take some with her.”

Happy to be tasked with something he deemed important, Bett quickly separated from Ahsoka, called a quick “I’ll be back!”, and sprinted off down the path that led to their home. Ahsoka and Mara both watched him run, tripping over his feet a bit as he went, until he was beyond their sightlines. After he disappeared, Mara turned back to Ahsoka, her arms crossed but not confrontationally. 

“So I owe you some money, huh?” She quirked an eyebrow, a teasing grin on her lips. In a way, she reminded Ahsoka of Obi-Wan; parental and chiding but always filled to the brim with dry humor, happy to pick apart any bit of speech. Ahsoka missed him, more than she should. They hadn’t left off on the best terms, but she’d _wanted_ to make things better. She’d thought she’d get the chance. She owed him that much. 

_Tell Anakin-_

_I will._

And he had. She couldn’t be mad at him for that. 

She’d seen him lift off with Padme’s ship, had felt him disappear through the atmosphere of Mustafar with the dying Senator. Ahsoka wanted to believe he was still out there, fighting the good fight. That he was doing everything he could to keep the Jedi way somehow alive. But Padme had died, that much she knew, and she hadn’t seen Obi-Wan since. 

She didn’t even know if Anakin was still out there. 

She’d seen clips, pieces of propaganda, of Palpatine and the dark, looming figure always in his shadow. _Darth Vader,_ they called him. A Master and an Apprentice. 

Maybe in her heart, Ahsoka knew, but he’d been falling apart before her very eyes on Mustafar. It was hard to believe that such a sad, depleted shell of a person was anywhere inside that monster hidden behind a mask. 

Maybe she just didn’t want to believe it. 

“I gotta pay the pilot somehow,” Ahsoka shrugged, pulling herself back to the present and shrugging the bag filled with her minimal belongings higher onto her shoulder. It was upsetting, pretending she needed anyone to do anything for her. She’d managed herself just fine back on Coruscant. But, as much as the idea of buying her own ship was tantalizing, making such a purchase not only took funds she didn’t have, but documents. Documents that would have to be filed under a name, that could be traced and reported to the Empire. 

Shuttle hopping was all she had. 

“I could just withhold your money for fixing Aven’s speeder, make you miss your ship and force you to stay with us for a little bit longer.”

It sounded nice, it really did. But not like something tangible. It sounded like an idealized daydream. Ahsoka had learned to become a realist. 

“But you’re not going to do that.”

After a second of holding Ahsoka’s gaze in challenge, Mara nodded with a smile and stepped closer, “But I’m not gonna do that.”

She took Ahsoka’s hands, still wrapped in the bracers she’d been wearing since Mandalore, and pressed a handful of credits into her palm. More than 64. A _lot_ more than 64, actually. 

“Mara-” she started, just as the older woman held a hand up to silence her, the way she would do with her kids if they started to complain. 

“I don’t want to hear it,” she hummed, “you’ve done more work on that stupid speeder than all the other mechanics on this rock put together. Not to mention all the times you helped fix the plumbing, the heating, all the times you watched the kids-”

“Because you kept feeding me,” Ahsoka tried again, picking out all but her owed 64, “I was basically living in your barn rent-free. You were the only people that would give me any work. _Please,_ I can’t take this.”

She held out the extra money again, shook it at Mara as if it would help bring her to her senses. There were only so many people on the satellite, only so many people to sell to. Ahsoka couldn’t dip into what little funds Mara and her kids had saved. Not more than she already had. 

But Mara just shook her head, her smile never wavering. “I know you don’t want to hear it because you like being a lonely person for reasons I won’t ask you to explain, but you weren’t a burden. I love my children more than life itself, but they might as well have been womp rats for all the help they provide keeping up the farm. I haven’t had someone like you helping us since Jaal-” she cut herself off, shook it out of her head, “well, in a long while. We care about you, Ashla, much as you may hate it. So if you’re not gonna stay and let me keep an eye on you, I might as well help you in what little way I can.”

Ahsoka, in all truth and genuine honesty, had never heard someone so openly admit to caring for her. Years ago, people had come close. But it was always in more subtle ways, dancing around rules and codes that no one person could change. And she’d accepted that for love. 

But hearing Mara shifted something in her so tectonically, that she just felt herself crumble. In silence, she trudged forward, almost pained by the sincerity of the moment, and threw her arms around the woman’s neck. Just as fast, Mara’s arms wound around Ahsoka’s torso, pulling her in tight. 

If she’d just stopped and shown him this kindness, what would’ve happened? If she’d not treated him so flippantly, would Anakin have even turned? Could all of this had been avoided?

It was too late now. 

She knew that, because if she thought about it too long she would trick herself into thinking it wasn’t, and that was nothing but a recipe for disaster. 

“Thank you,” she whispered, understanding Bett’s instinct to hide in his mother’s hair, in a way that felt warm and safe and homelike. 

“You’re always welcome, dear,” Mara responded, squeezing her once more then separating just as Bett ran up to them again. “Bett, my darling, what have you brought Ashla as a going-away present?”

Holding up the wire basket they used whenever the family and Ahsoka would go to the nearby field for lunch, Bett beamed and pulled free his haul. 

“I have that bird that Brina shot, some jogans that we picked earlier, celto, and,” he held up his final prize, a box of candies that must’ve been imported all the way from the Mid-Rim, at least, “my fizzer-sweets from Life Day.”

The box was abhorrently yellow, with bright green writing on the front loudly proclaiming this particular brand of fizzer-sweets to not only be the fizziest but also the sweetest in the galaxy. Ahsoka put all the contents of the basket except for the box into her own bag. 

“Bett, these are pretty hard to come by out here,” Ahsoka said as she knelt down, pushing the box gently back to him, “are you sure you really want to let me have them?”

He looked between Ahsoka and his mom, confused at her refusal. “Mama said to save them for a special occasion. I think this is special.”

The logic was so simple, so direct and to the point. Ahsoka missed being a kid and seeing the world like that. Everything would be easier that way. 

With a small smile, she took the box and opened it, pouring a handful of the sweets into her own hand before shaking it at him and motioning for him to raise his own palms. When he did, she poured a few out for him, and then got up to do the same for Mara. 

“I think it’d be much more special if we all had some.”

He beamed at that, before tossing the entire handful into his mouth, his eyes scrunching with both joy and pain at the sour kick of the candy. Ahsoka remembered when Plo had given her a box when they’d first arrived at the Jedi Temple as a way to pacify her rattled nerves. She had downed them in a similar way to Bett, eager to have anything to keep her occupied. 

Now, she placed one in her mouth and savored the taste before depositing the others in one of the smaller pockets of her bag. Looking over at Mara, who was carefully pecking at them in a similar fashion, Ahsoka was washed over with a sense of finality. This would be the last she saw of this family, this place, this lifestyle. Who knew what was to come next?

“Ashla!” Bett ran over and pulled at her cloak one more time, “can I have some more?”

Looking down, Ahsoka was shocked to realize she was still holding the box, to which she quickly handed to Bett in its entirety, who happily stuck his whole hand in and grabbed another fistful. “Don’t tell Brina or Aven, though. They’ll be jealous.”

“I won’t,” he shook his head dutifully, “I’m _very_ good at keeping secrets from them.”

He wasn’t, but that was what made the sentiment so sweet. 

With a sigh, Ahsoka nodded at the situation and then once to Mara, who was already watching her with a knowing look. 

“I should leave now.”

“I suppose you should.”

Ahsoka smiled at the woman, who returned the gesture tenfold as she stepped forward and mirrored Bett’s earlier action of ghosting a hand over her montrals. 

“Go find a planet where you can live,” Mara whispered, sending her blessings with Ahsoka as she took one final moment before she stepped back, back, back and turned to walk down the path to where she’d left the speeder she was renting, which would take her to the other side of the satellite, to the shuttle, to a new planet, to a new life. 

* * *

When Ahsoka arrived at the port, there was more activity than she’d seen in months. This side of the satellite, the one closer to the nearest planet, Hays Minor, was more densely populated than the other. Which wasn’t saying much, considering that in the village Ahsoka had been staying at with Mara and her family, there were maybe 20 residents including them. But still, this was closer to a city than anything Ahsoka had seen in a long time. Vendors lined the streets leading up to the port, a few small motels were set up in convenient locations, and a handful of restaurants made grand promises of local cuisine. 

And, on every screen and holo table, Emperor Palpatine sat and waved. 

Ahsoka drew her hood tighter over her head. 

There weren’t many bounty hunters stationed here, she’d made sure of that as soon as she’d arrived, but you never knew who could be lurking or passing through. You never knew what wanted posters they’d seen on their way over. 

Ahsoka hadn’t used the Force since Ossus, since lifting a fallen soldier into his unmarked grave. Sometimes she’d meditate and things would slip in through the cracks in the walls, but she didn’t want to risk it. And, more importantly, she didn’t want to try to reach out only to find nothing but suffering. 

So Ahsoka relied on her other instincts, the one she’d developed in her year away from the Jedi. She stuck to the sides of buildings and rooms, she tried to exist in the shadows as naturally as she could, and she bent her head just enough to not draw attention. 

As she entered the spaceport, buzzing and alive with people, she was greeted with posters of clones, faceless and proud, with asks to join “The Fight”, whatever that could possibly mean. The queue for the checkpoint into the terminal wasn’t long, but it was enough of a line that Ahsoka was forced to stand still, an action that caused her stress to manifest in the slight rapid tapping of her foot. 

She was almost out. She could make it. 

That was a sharp tap on her shoulder. 

Ahsoka almost drew her (Bly’s) blaster, briefly willing to shoot first and ask questions later. But there was a crowd, and she was about to pass through customs to take public transport. And surely there were cameras everywhere. 

She couldn’t afford a scene right now. 

So she choked down the urge and was instead greeted with Wilean, the Rodian who oversaw the market that Mara traded at. He smiled as much as a Rodian could and opened his arms in greeting. 

“Ashla! What’re you doin’ here?”

Damn all these people for being so kind and welcoming. 

“Moving on,” Ahsoka said with a smile, as best as she could manage, “I saw all the sights and tried all the foods. Figured now’s my time to try somewhere else on. What about you?”

“Meeting someone,” he shrugged, “some Empire goons doing one of those Jedi searches. You know the drill,” he rolled his eyes as if it was just another day at the office, “like they didn’t already round all those poor bastards up.”

Before Ahsoka could even process what he’d just said, the gates separating the front section of the port and the actual terminals opened up, and the speaker system overhead clicked on. 

_“We ask that all guests kindly step aside to allow our honored soldiers to make their way through the port. Business will resume momentarily. Again, we ask all guests to kindly step aside. Thank you, and have a safe flight.”_

Ahsoka barely had time to step aside as a squadron of clones walked through the gate, their steps perfectly in time and their presence abundantly known. She fought to keep her eyes neutral, to not look away or duck, which would only cause more suspicion. From next to her, Wilean jogged over to one of the clones in the front line of their squadron, chatting casually and welcoming them. Ahsoka didn’t hear what the response was, but it was short. After, Wilean nodded, more serious now, and turned to lead them out the front and off into the distance. 

“Next!” the woman situated at the checkpoint called, and Ahsoka looked over to realize it was her that she was calling. The papers she’d painstakingly forged in one hand, and her credits in another, Ahsoka tried to take a step forward and found herself stuck. 

Mara had no reason to know who Ahsoka was. She’d _never_ mentioned it, never even alluded to it, and Mara had always been kind enough never to press. The kids barely even knew what Jedi were, much less that they were in hiding now. They’d had no reason to suspect Ahsoka. 

But the Empire wasn’t acting rationally right now. They could see any number of markings Ahsoka had left behind, like the speeder she’d helped fix or the meals she’d helped Mara cook or the drawing Aven had made of her and his family that was hanging up on their wall. 

The idea of any of them being hurt because Ahsoka had been selfish enough to let them in…

But she shouldn’t turn back. She should walk away. She was _right there._

She’d learned this lesson over and over and over. 

“Hey!” the woman at the checkpoint called again, trying to get Ahsoka’s attention, but she was already turning around, sprinting to where her speeder was still parked, waiting like it knew that she could never truly leave. 

* * *

Ahsoka made it to the farm in record time. She probably broke hundreds of traffic laws along the way, but for once she didn’t care about being careful. She’d always been good at riding, better from her years with Anakin, and as she swerved off the beaten path to cut through the tall fields surrounding the house, she was glad for her ability to control the speeder in such a difficult terrain. 

She pulled to a stop just before the field ended, hopping off the bike and swinging the blaster to her front, ready to aim and fire. She’d ditched her bag and cloak with the speeder, ready to forgo practicality for the sake of finesse. With her eye trained through the scope, she approached. 

She hadn’t learned to shoot from the Jedi. They had hardly trained anyone in anything other than the lightsaber. 

_This is your life, and you will be dead without it._

Rex had been the one that taught her after he’d seen her half-heartedly fiddling with a blaster rifle a few weeks into her time as a Padawan. She’d been trying to hit a target at their camp, long after everyone had gone to sleep except for the night shift, and he’d been coming back from the lake they were nearby when she’d nearly taken off his head. 

_What’ve you got there, Youngling?_ He’d called, still unsure enough of her abilities to use the nickname. 

She’d tried to hide Tup’s rifle behind her back, but he wasn’t having it. After she gave the sad excuse of _I’m bored,_ he’d sighed and told her to aim again but not fire. 

_Never too late to learn, only too proud._

When she’d held it up, he’d immediately adjusted just about every bone in her body, chiding her for standing like a Jedi rather than a soldier. He’d been mad when she’d pointed out that, at that point in time, they were one and the same. 

After a night of shooting, she was able to at least hit the target one in ten times. 

After years of working with him, she was almost as good a shot as him. 

His teachings echoed through her head as she crouched among the grain, the rifle pulled high up and her finger hovering over the trigger. 

There were only a handful of speeders in front of the house. Maybe they’d split up, who was to say? But the important thing was that there _were_ speeders. Speeders but no men in sight. That meant she was either too late, or it was approaching that. After swinging the rifle left and right to double-check her surroundings she half-crouched, half-ran to the back of the house, facing the barn, and ducked behind one of the flower boxes for cover. 

Just as she was about to peek through the window to see who was inside, there was the faintest sound of a _shh!_ And she immediately twisted to point the blaster at the noise. Through the scope, she could see all three kids crowded into one another, eyes quivering with fear. Ahsoka noticed a fizzer-sweet in both Aven and Brina’s hands, with Bett in front holding the box. A good kid. 

Brina opened her mouth to say something, but Ahsoka quickly raised a finger to her own lips and stared the girl down, a silent plea for quiet. They were safe, which meant the world, but Mara wasn’t with them, which meant she was still in danger. 

Understanding her silent message, all three children nodded and backed up into the shadow of the barn, but not before Bett pointed to the house Ahsoka was crouched behind and held up four fingers. 

Mara would’ve asked her to remain with the kids and made sure that stayed safe, but that’s because she was selfless like that. Ahsoka was selfish, and went against what she knew the woman would’ve wanted by opening the door. 

She poked the barrel of the blaster in first, checked twice to make sure it was safe, then rolled in silently. She didn’t mean to, but it was instinct to use the Force to mask any noises she made. The door she’d entered led to the kitchen, which in turn could take her one of two places: the living room or the stairs that led to the bedrooms. Before she even had to choose, she heard Mara’s distinct voice yell “Stop!” before shots rang out from the living room. 

Foregoing stealth, Ahsoka got up and sprinted through the doorway, blaster raised to fire, only to find Mara staring with her own rifle, albeit a much older and more rustic make than Ahsoka’s, with smoke coming from the end and four white-clad bodies littering the carpet. 

In the space of a breath, she spun on her heels and pointed the rifle at Ahsoka, who quickly let hers fall back onto the strap and swing to her hips, her hands coming up in the universal sign of surrender, “It’s me! Mara, it’s me!”

Mara didn’t lower her rifle. Her eye stayed at the scope, the rest of her face hard and angry. She wasn’t relieved in the slightest. 

“What’s your name.” Not a question, a command. 

“Mara, you know-”

“I _knew_ a girl named Ashla!” She shouted, her hands never quivering. Her husband had been an officer during the Clone Wars. He must’ve taught her. “Then these _people_ come barging in, looking for a togruta girl your age with a name I’ve never heard-”

“I didn’t _lie to you-”_

 _“Yes you did!”_ She hollered, cocking the rifle. And for one second, Ahsoka really thought she was going to shoot, she braced herself for the punch to the gut, but just as she did, she saw a flash of white sprint through the front door, a blaster pistol in hand and trained at the two of them. 

Mara had only managed to turn her head by the time Ahsoka’s instincts kicked in, causing her to throw out both hands and use the Force to propel the clone into the wall, where a sickening crack rang out before he fell limply to the floor. 

The adrenaline coursed through Ahsoka’s blood, high from the fighting and the use of a part of her brain that had lain dormant for a long time, but also from the use of the Force after so long, which called to her like a sweet song. 

But it was met with the bitter look Mara gave her, one of disgust and hatred. 

“ _Who. Are. You?”_ She asked, speaking slowly and making every syllable count. 

Ahsoka couldn’t bring herself to lie. Not after so long. Not after everything she’d just caused. 

“My name is Ahsoka Tano.”

Mara’s finger hovered over the trigger. “You know that doesn’t mean anything. Who are you and why’s the Empire hunting you down?”

She hadn’t said these words in so long. She hadn’t even really thought them to be true for a while. “I was a Jedi, part of the Order.”

Finally, Mara’s grip slackened, if just a hair. But not out of the usual kindness Ahsoka had grown so accustomed to. Instead, she just dipped her head a bit, clearly swimming in thought. “Tano…” she pondered out loud. “You were that Skywalker guy’s apprentice, right? The one who liberated Naboo when he was a kid?”

Sith hells. Leave it to Anakin to always make everything about him, even when he wasn’t even on the planet. Stars, she _hoped_ he would never set foot on this world. 

“Yeah,” Ahsoka nodded slowly, “but I left. It’s complicated. Please, Mara, can you put the blaster down and we can talk about this?”

“You were the one who blew up the Temple on Coruscant?” Mara asked, distinctly _not_ lowering the gun. Ahsoka briefly reached into the Force again to see where the kids were; thankfully still in the barn. She didn’t want them to see their mother like this. “Doesn’t seem to me like you left so much as you were thrown out.”

“I wasn’t the one-”

“Jaal _died_ for you all!” She shouted, her face growing red from the anger. Wasn’t that just… Wasn’t it just a punch straight to the jaw? The last thing she wanted to hear even after _all_ the other things she didn’t want to hear had already been said?

“I never wanted people to die. _We_ never wanted people to die,” she said plainly. Something she could say with certainty of a full truth.

“That doesn’t matter,” she sneered, “it was still your Order, your _war._ ” Finally - _finally-_ she lowered the blaster, turned away from Ahsoka. “I can’t believe you came into my home, watched _my_ children when you _knew_ that you people are being hunted like animals!” She stabbed the barrel of her blaster into one of the corpses on the floor. “You put my family in danger, and I can’t forgive that.”

“I was leaving to keep you safe!” Ahsoka tried to reason, desperate to let this woman who’d taken her in know that she’d never meant for any of this to happen, “I was leaving so they wouldn’t come here searching for me! I only came back _because_ I wanted to protect you!”

“And look how well that turned out!” Without warning, Mara crowded her space, getting right into Ahsoka’s face. She wasn’t a large woman, but suddenly she became the tallest person in the room by yards. “My children are hiding in that barn, unaware of whether I am alive or dead because of you. From now on I have to lie to everyone I know just in order to keep them safe, because of _you.”_ In her eyes, down her golden cheeks, tears had begun to well and pour. 

Ahsoka, at a loss for words, just choked out a meager “I’m sorry. I never meant for this to happen.”

Mara held her gaze for another moment, then let out a frustrated sigh and turned around, pinching the bridge of her nose, “We fed you, housed you, helped you, and you couldn’t even be _honest_ with us. With _me.”_ She turned on her last word, this time not angry, just hurt. “If you had just _talked_ to me, we could’ve figured something out.”

“I’m sorry-”

“It’s too late for that!” Mara cut her off, “I had to kill four men today because of you. And now I have to go tell my kids to stay in the barn while I deal with the bodies-”

“Let me tell them-”

In a blink, Mara raised the blaster again, pointed straight at Ahsoka’s chest, “don’t you dare. I don’t want you near them. I don’t want you speaking to them. The less they know, the safer they’ll be.”

Ahsoka took a deep breath, tried to remain calm. “What do you want me to do?”

“I want you to leave.” She said, plain and simple, “I want you to get on the next flight off this rock, I don’t care where to, and I want to forget about us. About our names, what we did for you, that we even exist.” She cocked the blaster again, “And if anything, and I mean _anything,_ _ever_ happens to my kids because of you, I don’t care who the Empire sends, I will find you first and I will make you _beg_ that they’d gotten you instead of me. Nod if you understand me.”

Ahsoka nodded, numb. 

“Good. Now get out.” She stepped aside, motioning to the front door, as to avoid Ahsoka seeing the kids. 

She wanted to turn around, wanted to apologize again, but the second she was out the door it slammed shut behind her, the lock clicking closed and telling her to get lost. 

When she rounded the corner to head into the field to retrieve her speeder and belongings, she caught sight of the barn, where three small heads were peaking out. Faintly, distantly, she heard one of them shout “Ashla! Ashla!” and wave frantically, trying to get her attention. She did her best to ignore their calls and bit her tongue at the way it twisted her chest. 

As she straddled the speeder and set it in motion, she thought of how much better off her life could be if she would ever just learn her fucking lesson.


	2. Part Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Her cloak had long since gone from brown to gray. Call it a tactical change of pace. Call it a thin attempt at blending into the background of crowds. Call it the first thing she could get her hands on. We all know what it was. 
> 
> Defeat. 
> 
> She’d thought –fought for the chance– that she could still lead a relatively normal life. She’d dared to imagine that even if it was only for months at a time, she would still be able to find home and comfort. That maybe it wouldn’t be so different from her year away from the Order, where she’d had to blaze her own path but she’d met people along the way that would help her. 
> 
> That was the idealized wish of a stupid, stupid child. Ahsoka had given up her right to happiness when she’d chosen to run, to stay alive. "

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm baaaaaacccccckkkkkkkkkk

Her cloak had long since gone from brown to gray. Call it a tactical change of pace. Call it a thin attempt at blending into the background of crowds. Call it the first thing she could get her hands on. We all know what it was. 

Defeat. 

She’d thought –fought for the chance– that she could still lead a relatively normal life. She’d dared to imagine that even if it was only for months at a time, she would still be able to find home and comfort. That maybe it wouldn’t be so different from her year away from the Order, where she’d had to blaze her own path but she’d met people along the way that would help her. 

That was the idealized wish of a stupid,  _ stupid _ child. Ahsoka had given up her right to happiness when she’d chosen to run, to stay alive. 

She thought about it sometimes, about turning herself in. What was the worst they’d do to her? Kill her? At least she wouldn’t be taking anyone else down with her. 

But she’d heard about what happened to those rogue Jedi they managed to round up, who were still young and malleable as clay.  _ Inquisitors. _ That’s the word they’d come up with for these dark shadows of former Padawans, Force users they’d captured and beaten and broken until they forgot the difference between good and bad. 

A stronger person, someone like Obi-Wan, would be able to hold their head up high against that threat. They’d be able to say  _ fuck that, you’ll never break me. _ Ahsoka was strong, but she was growing weaker by the day. And they, the Inquisitorious, they had a leader that knew the direct path to cut that would pierce her through the heart. 

If it wasn’t  _ him, _ wasn’t the man wearing Anakin’s face like a trophy, maybe Ahsoka could be strong. But it was, and she wasn’t. As much as she hated it, hated herself for this truth, she knew that if they tried to turn her, he would be able to do it. 

She hated him, despised him for everything that was no one's fault but his, and she knew that this did nothing but play into his hand. If she were to be brought in, they would play into all of these weaknesses until she was just another one of his stupid puppets, sent to snuff out any other semblances of hope left in the galaxy. 

She could hate herself for this, but at least it was truth. She’d hate herself more if she’d lived in denial of this fact and get captured, and then be falsely surprised when their reconditioning worked. Then she would be forced to watch in horror as she did this emperor’s dirty work, bringing immeasurable harm to people she could have spared if she was just honest with herself. 

They would never force her to live like that. They would never get the chance. 

They would not take her alive, no matter the cost. 

They could break and reconfigure Anakin all they wanted, but she would never give them the chance.  _ That _ was the Jedi way. If he’d been stronger, he would’ve realized that. But he was weak, and he broke the galaxy because of his weakness. 

(If she was as honest with herself as she claimed to be, she would recognize this at the knee-jerk reaction it was. She’d see that it was her lashing out, pinning all the blame on him when, in reality, there was enough to go around. Would it not be just as fair for her to hate the Jedi themselves for imposing such a dominating system that would cause him to break under the pressure? What about Obi-Wan, who had seen his own student at his most vulnerable and instead of helping, turned his back and cast him away, not even giving him the honor of a swift death? Would it not be just as fair to pin blame on Padme, who surely would’ve known of these problems and just hoped for the best? What about Ahsoka who, when given the chance, had raised her walls instead of lowering them, steeling herself against his kindness. Who, when she’d seen him last, had followed step by step in Obi-Wan’s path, wanting to  _ hurt _ Anakin for betraying her trust in a way she didn’t even fully understand at the time. If she was truly as fair and honest as she saw herself, she would see that justice was a balanced scale, not an onslaught of righteous fury.)

* * *

Since Mara and Bett, Ahsoka hadn’t lingered. She refused to stay anywhere long enough to put someone in danger again. This was the new way of the Jedi, nomadic and cold. 

The first test of this new faith was on Tatooine, a solar flare of a planet that she’d only ever heard second-hand accounts of. 

_ If there was a bright center of the universe, that dustball is the farthest thing from it, _ Anakin had told her once, tone bitter in a way that should’ve sounded more like foreshadowing than it had at the time.  _ Trust me, there’s nothing there worth visiting.  _

_ Don’t you have family there? _ she’d asked, still new to being his Padawan at the time.

_ No. Not anymore. _ And that was that. 

She should’ve taken his word for it, but she didn’t want to admit he was right, not about anything. Not anymore. 

But… there wasn’t much to see. She should’ve been relieved that this, seeing as she was trying to  _ avoid _ the public eye. But it was still early in her journey into total isolation. She hadn’t expected to be thrown into the chilling deep end as quickly as she would pretend. 

The shuttle to Tatooine had been the first one off the satellite she could get on after her final confrontation with Mara. If she couldn’t convince her that she’d never meant harm, she could at least honor her wishes. She’d gotten on without even looking at the destination. 

The flight was one of shivering and fear. She sat on the steel bench, pressed between a Rodian and a Nautolan, and prayed to the Force that there wouldn’t be a random stop of the ship. There shouldn’t be, considering how far away they were from the core worlds, but they were coming from a satellite where a known Jedi had just been reported. Anything was possible. 

But they landed without issue. Ahsoka gathered her handful of things, pulled her hood down low, and went on her way. Was it sad, the way she clutched the handful of fruits Bett had brought her like they were precious jewels? Wasn’t it pathetic, how she knew she would have to eat them soon, before they went bad, but she couldn’t bear to part with the memory of the sweet boy. Not yet. 

Instead, she took the credits Mara had given her, the ones she’d never felt like she’d deserved and now just wanted to be rid of, and decided she deserved a drink. Who wouldn’t, after what she’d been through?

Ahsoka had not been a bad Padawan. She'd been diligent and poised, had understood the importance of good appearance and professionalism, and worked harder than most she knew. But she hadn’t been immune to being a teenager. 

Jedi didn’t drink. It wasn’t expressly forbidden, but they were always expected to be operating on full systems. This didn’t leave room for inebriation. 

But she knew Anakin, or at least she had, once upon a time ago. She’d known where he hid a bottle of  _ something _ under his bed, how every once in a while, if he was celebrating a big win, he’d break it out and share a round with the 501st. She could remember how they all would collectively look the other way as she poured herself just a sip, just to feel like she was part of something. 

He’d told her once that if she ever got caught doing something stupid, he wouldn’t bail her out. That having fun would always have to come second place to duty, but it should count for something. She’d called him on his lie immediately, knowing that back then he would never leave her out to dry. 

She missed  _ back then. _ She despised that feeling. She was too young to feel nostalgia for the good old days. 

The cantina she wandered into was a pathetic thing. She’d grown up on Coruscant, she’d known opulence and finery her whole life, even if it was from a distance. This was stone and metal crudely welded together and called a bar. Still, she sat. 

She’d ordered something strong, and then repeated the order twice more before someone worked up the courage to talk to her. 

She didn’t quite remember their names. Bowen and Maroo, or something along those lines. They were a young couple, human, and clearly locals. Two kids who were just trying to be kind to a stranger passing through. 

Ahsoka knew how that story ended. In tragedy and heartbreak. They never stood a chance. 

They’d only just managed to ask her where she was coming from by the time she’d slammed her credits down onto the bar’s counter and got up to leave. She’d overstayed her welcome once before. Maybe this time she would learn from her mistakes. 

The speeder she found was an old thing, almost falling apart at the seams. She didn’t care. It still ran, didn’t it? She could relate. 

As she sped into the desert, she didn’t know what she was looking for, but she knew what she wasn’t. 

She  _ wasn’t _ looking for a crowd, someone who would see her struggling to hold her mask’s pieces together and pity her for it. 

She wasn’t looking for a group, people that she would bring harm to no matter how hard she tried to avoid it.

You haven’t lived until you’ve screamed into an open and empty desert that doesn’t care if you live or die. Or, maybe the opposite is true. Maybe you haven’t finished your first life and moved on to your second until you’ve done that. 

Because when Ahsoka found herself in the middle of nowhere on a nowhere planet in a nowhere system, as she’d slowed her speeder down to watch the last flicker of the twin suns setting on the horizon, Ahsoka felt rage. 

Anakin had hated those suns. He’d told her that once, how they’d always felt so out of reach when he’d been growing up. How he’d wanted nothing more than to fly up to them and swallow them whole. How they’d been a reminder of how stuck he was, literally hovering above him like a sword about to drop. 

But there was nothing hateful in them. These stars weren’t malicious, they were beautiful. They painted the sky pink and purple in a way Ahsoka had never seen before against such a gentle landscape. 

It was his fault that he couldn’t get over himself long enough to see that these things he hated so much were precious, that they brought life to a world that was otherwise dead. 

When they disappeared beneath the horizon line, Ahsoka yelled as if it would bring them back. Bring him back. Bring back her old life. 

She yelled as an offering to Tatooine to change its rotation on its axis and let her see the suns again. She wanted her justification, her fact to point to in order to let herself know that he was wrongwrong _ wrong _ and he’d been broken from the start.

Because without these suns, she could see how sad and lonely and imprisoning this planet was. Without that brief moment of beauty, there was truth to his words, and she hated that she could see his point. 

Hated. That was such a strong word. 

Ahsoka had never hated before. 

She’d despised. Been angered by. Feared. Fought. 

But never hated. 

Not even Maul or Dooku or the Separatists. Not even Barriss, who had been the cause of Ahsoka’s undoing. 

Because, as much as she might have disagreed with everything they stood for, they still had a part to play in this grand scheme. Dark and Light, both were needed for balance. That had been one of the first things she’d been taught as a Youngling. 

But she hated Anakin. With her whole chest, being, heart. 

Because it hadn’t always been that way. She’d once admired him, aspired to be him when she grew up, loved him like the brother he had been to her. And he’d dismantled all of that, all by himself. 

(She should know that she’d played a part, too.)

When Ahsoka screamed into the Tatooine night, she did it with all of the hatred and rage that hummed in her heart, that had been brought to the surface by the events on Mara’s farm. When she yelled, she let these bottled feelings out, and felt them course through her veins in a way that felt familiar and new and welcoming and dangerous. 

Around her, the world exploded. 

Sand burst up and out in all directions, and in a heartbeat, Ahsoka knew what had happened. 

The Dark Side of the Force had always been accompanied by these feelings. Or maybe vice versa. 

And she hated him all over again, because wasn’t this exactly what he and this new empire wanted? Wasn’t this exactly how he fell?

Ahsoka hated that, even now, she was still following in his footsteps. 

That was where her internal resolve came from. 

No more. 

No more threat of the Force overwhelming her. She would not tempt fate and put more in danger to carry on the traditions of a dying Order. She would not dance the same pattern Anakin had before he’d fallen prey to temptation and rage. 

Alone in the desert, in the destruction she’d left in her wake, Ahsoka Tano made herself a promise. No more. And with that oath to herself, she closed off her connection. No more half-baked hands-off approach that would still come out if she thought she  _ really _ needed it. No more reason to hate herself, too. No more running, because it was the Jedi that were on the run. And she wasn’t one of them anymore. 

In the darkness of the desert, Ahsoka Tano abandoned her faith. 

* * *

A brown cloak that becomes gray. A montral that now reached her biceps rather than just her shoulders. The hundreds of planets she’d seen and left. This was how Ahsoka measured time, now. Not by years and days, not by news from the core worlds. Just by herself, the only thing that seemed really tangible anymore. 

For a few months, Ahsoka had kept the bracers she’d been given by Bo-Katan, had etched a notch into them every time she traveled to a different world. Now, that just seemed silly. Why should she force proof of her existence into the galaxy, when she could just as easily keep track of it in her head? She had long since let those bracers fall into the abyss of space. They couldn’t hurt anyone there. 

Ryloth was the planet she currently found herself on. She’d worked it down to a science, this planet-hopping business. She could stay for a week. Two, at the most. And then she would be gone again. Two weeks wasn’t enough time to affect the people around you, to make an impact that would linger. Two weeks was just enough time for her to pick up a stray bounty hunting or engineering job, whatever there was to offer, so that she could afford the shuttle to the next place, where she would repeat it all over again. 

The rooms she found herself staying in were always the same. Unremarkable walls with a stiff bed and flimsy pillows. A holoscreen that you had to pay to use and a singular painting that was meant to inspire cheer but always managed to come off as hollow. 

Her life was inside the two bags that were stashed underneath her bed. Each with just enough to let her survive in case she was parted from the other. Clothes, non-perishable food, water, and half the credits she didn’t already keep on her person. Her life was under the bed, and her protection was under the pillow. 

Bly’s rifle hadn’t been used regularly, but she kept it clean. Because she had to be ready. If she let herself slip again, forget how dangerous the galaxy truly was, she wouldn’t get a second chance. Another one, at least. 

Next to the rifle, lay an entirely plain dagger. She’d bought it soon after leaving Tatooine, something that was small and concealable that she could take into town with her and not draw as much attention as a blaster. 

Something that could hide in her shoe. 

Something that felt faintly like a memory, whenever she held it. 

She’d already been on Ryloth for a week, was edging closer to her personal deadline by the minute. But she was short on cash, and she’d already taken up a bounty. 

She didn’t work for the guild; didn’t want a name –even a fake one– that could be traced to her put out into the universe like that. But that was the beauty of the bounty community: there were plenty of people willing to pay someone under the table for the job to be done. 

She didn’t kill people. That much she couldn’t even pretend to forget.  _ Always in defense. Never for attack.  _ She’d long since shaken her religious following of the Jedi Code, but that was the one thing she couldn’t seem to get rid of. It made her question if it was a matter of how she’d been raised or just who she was once all of that was stripped away. 

She’d thought Anakin was like that; once upon a time ago. But hadn’t she always known the truth? That he had always been one to strike first and ask questions later? Hadn’t she seen that as a good thing?

Nya Mi was the name of the woman Ahsoka was hunting. Not to kill her –she wasn’t ready for that yet– but to bring her in. She didn’t know what the woman had done, who she’d wronged or killed, but she had a high price and was wanted alive. That was all she needed. 

It turned out, though, that she was better at slipping through the cracks than the others Ahsoka had hunted. Usually, they were careless enough to wander into the local bars or clubs, looking for a cold drink or a warm body. Ahsoka was always there waiting, a knife in her hand and an unreadable look on her face. 

But Nya had managed to skate by unnoticed. Ahsoka had visited all the seedy locals in the town twice, and she’d yet to find what had been described to her as a “young and dangerous twi’lek girl”. 

Ahsoka could handle danger. Even without the Force or her sabers. She made it work. It was just that finding people had been much easier when she’d been able to use those things. But not anymore. Now she was forced to do things the tried and true old fashioned way. 

The body beneath her forearm slammed into the stone wall with a satisfying thud. “Where’s the twi’lek?” she asked, her knife held steady in her other hand, a hair’s width from the man’s cheek. 

He looked a bit like Obi-Wan, if she squinted; a graying beard and a kind glint in his eyes. Or at least there had been, before she’d begun pointing weapons at him. Now there was just fear and a fight to stay calm. Before, though, when she’d approached under the guise of needing directions, he’d seemed truly nice. 

“Who?” He begged, his eyes wide. He was soft around the edges, untoned and sweet. This wasn’t the kind of guy who saw a fight often. Definitely not the kind who’d ever been in the middle of one. But times were a’changing, and it was becoming increasingly difficult to keep your hands clean. 

If not her, Ahsoka figured, then someone else would soon be along to give him his first battle scar. She’d just beaten everyone to the punch. 

She already had her fair share of battle scars. Nics on her montrals, where sabers or blasters had come a little too close. Bones that had been both broken and healed on the same star cruiser’s voyage. A slight, ever-present favoring of her right leg after she’d landed poorly on her right one during a training exercise even before she’d become a Padawan. 

She’d left her life behind, but it hadn’t left her. It was ingrained in her in a way that she’d never be fully rid of. 

But not this guy, who’d never seen battle. Never walked among soldiers and called them family. He hadn’t seen the frontlines of battle every day before he’d had his first kiss, his first deathstick, his first in so many things. 

Ahsoka had had firsts that few others ever would. A first kill. A first time disarming a Sith Lord. A first planet that she couldn’t save. A first teacher she’d told to burn. 

“I don’t know who you’re talking about, please. Please, let me go,” he begged, his eyes never wavering from the vibroblade. It was an elegant thing, so simple in its design. So lethal in its execution. “Do you want credits? I have credits. I can give you however much you need.”

However much he thought she was getting for this job, he was wrong. She’d learned that the everyday galactic citizen, they didn’t realize how much people were willing to pay for someone to be brought in dead or alive. 

And to think, Ahsoka and all the other schmucks of the Jedi Order had been doing it for free. 

“I don’t want your credits,” Ahsoka said calmly, “I want you to tell me where your twi’lek friend is. I know you’ve been seen in the area with her. Maybe if you tell me what I want to know, I’ll let you go with all ten of your fingers.”

It was a gamble. Ahsoka didn’t, in fact, know if he was friends with the twi’lek girl she was hunting. But she  _ did _ know that when she’d stopped in the nearest cantina and asked for a twi’lek girl, she’d been pointed in this guy’s direction. It wasn’t much to go on, but it was something. And right now, she’d take anything. 

“I don’t know who–” Ahsoka leaned in  _ just _ a bit more with the knife, “Fine! Fine. Okay, I– yes. I know a twi’lek girl. Yes. I will take you to her, okay. Okay? Please, just take the knife off my throat.”

Ahsoka didn’t.

“I can’t show you where she is if I can’t move!”

Slowly, Ahsoka drew back her blade, careful to keep it unsheathed and in sight. A reminder. “Promise you won’t try to run away on me?”

He nodded, breathing raggedly. 

“Good. Lead the way.”

Ahsoka was not cruel, but she’d learned how to toughen her skin. It was a regrettably necessary adjustment that she’d made for her day to day life. Kindness, softness, pacificity: she’d seen what had become of those who had taken these traits as their ideals. 

Satine. Padme. Obi-Wan. Even Ahsoka herself, for a time. 

Now look at them. Dead. Dead. Vanished. Scattered in the sky like stardust. 

But she’d know those who were strong, aggressive, and sometimes even cruel. 

Anakin had been these things. Anakin was alive. Anakin was running the whole damn universe. 

_ A Jedi’s strength is in his honor, _ Obi-Wan had once told her.  _ And if we lose that, we lose everything. _

Ahsoka had already lost everything.  _ Everything. _ Obi-Wan hadn’t known what he was talking about. Back then, he’d had the luxury of thinking that the worst-case scenario was an attack on character. 

Ahsoka was living the worst-case scenario. She knew better. 

The man kept walking, his hands held above his head. Ahsoka got the feeling that he’d watched a lot of holovids where this had happened, a knife pointed to the main character’s back by some thug in an alleyway. She imagined that he fancied himself the protagonist, and that right now he was weighing the pros and cons of trying to make a break for it, or worse attempt to fight her off. 

She wondered absently if he realized she’d been raised for war. In war. At war. 

But she didn’t want it to come to that. It  _ couldn’t _ come to that. Because if he saw her fight with a level of finesse that no regular person had access to, he’d ask questions. And if he looked again and made an attempt to guess her age, he’d see that she was old enough to have been one of those Jedi that everyone seemed to hate so much now. 

She couldn’t have him drawing his own conclusions, so instead, she dug her knife into his back one more time just to remind him not to get any ideas. End the issue before it began. 

“Please, what do you want from us?” the man said after they’d walked a few blocks, turning into a thinner alleyway with doors lining the street, leading to progressively low rent homes. Then again, everything in this small town was low rent. Ahsoka would know, she’d chosen it for just that reason. But wasn’t that exactly why these people would hide here? After all, she was wanted and on the run, and it was exactly where she’d wound up. (Then again, she probably shouldn’t be trying to draw comparisons between herself and the people she was trying to turn in for profit.)

“I want you to show me where the girl is,” Ahsoka said, keeping her voice carefully even. She glanced up to the windows around them, taking note of which ones were lit and which ones were already dark. Then again, how likely was it really that any of their neighbors would come if they heard a commotion?

“But what do you  _ want?” _

Stars, she wished she knew. It wasn’t… It wasn’t that she wanted her old life back. She knew better now, had learned from that past. To want to go back, to want nothing more than to turn back the clock, would be childish at best, destructive at worst. 

She wanted to be safe, but who didn’t? And what did that even mean, anyway? Living like this wasn’t  _ safe. _ Her living at all wasn’t safe. She couldn’t fix that. Couldn’t change the way things had worked out. 

Maybe that’s what she wanted. To tear down this whole new system. Brick by brick. Person by person. She wanted to have control of her own life back, instead of having to drop in like a ghost to a new planet every week. 

But that was the dreams of a kid, an optimist. Optimism had left her a long time ago, on Ossus as she’d pressed the barrel of a rifle into her brother’s skull and kept her eyes open as she pulled the trigger. Optimism was a fool’s errand, a risk she didn’t have the means to make. She could fantasize every day about how she could turn this all around; kill Palpatine herself, find some secret way to sabotage the Empire, reverse the hatred wired into the clones. Bring Anakin back. 

But none of it was real. 

None of it was for her, not now or ever again. 

It was just a whimsical fantasy, something she could whisper to herself when she was too tired to stay guarded anymore, and it would drain the tension from her shoulders for the briefest of moments. 

And every time, she would be reminded a few seconds later that she didn’t have time to lose that tension. Tension, awareness, all of it, that’s what kept her alive now. 

Leisure was for the dead. 

“I  _ want _ you,” Ahsoka gritted out, “to stop talking and show me where the girl is.”

This, she could handle. This was realistic. Not some fantasy for another lifetime. Small and doable and profitable. Safe, safe, safe. 

Finally, he stopped in front of a door, a keypad waiting to its side to be used. Ahsoka prodded him, tilting her head and telling him to enter the code. With shaky hands, he reached up and punched in the numbers, glancing back to her just as his fingers hovered over the  _ Enter _ key. 

_ “Please,” _ He tried, one more time. 

Ahsoka just frowned, turned her knife over in her palm as a reminder. He pressed enter. 

It all happened in a very quick blur. As the door slid open, as the man slid away to let Ahsoka through first, she caught sight of a small figure. Behind the door, there was a narrow hallway leading into a living room, where a young Twi’lek was on her knees on the threadbare carpet. She was younger than Ahsoka had expected. She’d been picturing someone her own age from when she’d fought in the Clone Wars, a teenager just barely old enough to know what they were doing. 

But she was young, her cheeks still round with baby fat and her lekku barely brushing her shoulders. There were small, portable stuffed animals surrounding her, arranged to all be facing inward like they were sharing a meal. And, between her hands, one –a tooka– hovered midair. 

Ahsoka moved faster than she had in a  _ long _ time. Abandoning the man at the door, she sprinted forward and grabbed the plushie out of the air, holding on tight in case the girl tried to summon it again. 

She… Ahsoka hadn’t even known. She hadn’t even felt a pulse in the Force coming from inside the house. She should’ve  _ asked.  _ She should’ve asked the people who were hunting her  _ why  _ she was so dangerous, what she’d done. If Ahsoka had known– If she’d known that this was about a Force user–

She would’ve run. That was the hard truth. She would’ve gotten as far away as she could as fast as possible. She would’ve been on another planet by now, maybe another system entirely. 

She would’ve left the bounty open. She would’ve given someone else the chance to collect, to take her into whoever wanted her. The Empire or worse. Ahsoka had heard rumors,  _ dark _ rumors of Force users being captured and bartered like products. What could they do about it? If they fought back, there was the immediate threat of the Empire. Ahsoka couldn’t decide which fate was worse. 

Ahsoka would have let that happen. Not directly, but through her own inaction. Through her own fear. She would’ve sentenced this girl to death, just to keep herself safe. 

It was a cold thought, one that pricked in her spine like needles. 

“Mine!” The girl cried, reaching her hands out for Ahsoka to return the toy. When she didn’t, the twi’lek turned to the door where the man was coming in, shutting it behind himself. “Papa! My doll! She took it!”

The man just gave Ahsoka a look, desperate and unsure of what was coming next. Ahsoka didn’t know either, to be perfectly honest. All she could do was stand there, her hands unknowingly strangling the stuffed tooka in their grip. They’d always been the hands of a killer. She’d thought she could change her ways, but it was never, never,  _ never _ so easy. 

As she stood there, processing, the man stuck around her, reaching down and picking the twi’lek up, sitting her on his hip and bouncing her a bit. Trying to calm her down. 

“Papa, I’m scared,” the girl blubbered, and that was what sent Ahsoka over the edge. Because an untrained Force-sensitive kid was a problem, but a problem that could be dealt with. But an untrained Force-sensitive kid who was emotional, who might accidentally lash out in a way they didn’t know how to control, was a problem with very limited solutions. 

“I know, baby, I know,” the man hushed, running his hand over her lekku and looking with panicked eyes at Ahsoka. 

“She’s your kid?” Ahsoka asked, even though that wasn’t the main priority. She was just trying to process, to give herself time to think. 

“It’s complicated.”

Stars, wasn’t everything?

With a nod, she began pacing the room. It was barren, a hint that they were as nomadic as she was, and there was a kind of solace that she found in the recognition of an equal issue. But it wasn’t truly the same, because this girl, Nya Mi if Ahsoka’s information was to be believed, had someone. A father to look out for her, to not only keep her safe but keep her company. At the very,  _ very _ least, she wasn’t alone. 

“Please,” the man tried again, “we didn’t ask for this. We just… we won’t cause any problems. We’re just trying to stay safe. We don’t want trouble. I don’t–” he looked to the kid, “I don’t know what else to tell you. We don’t want trouble.”

Ahsoka did another lap around the room, suddenly and painfully missing the weight of her sabers in her hands. They had been so constant (and then not and then again). So reassuring in their power, their symbolism to everything she’d once held sacred. They’d been heavy enough in their implications to tether Ahsoka to the surface of any planet she was on. 

“I believe you,” she said, careful, “and I want to try to help you, I do.”

The man’s shoulder’s loosened, though only a fraction. 

“But,” Ahsoka stopped moving, had to look at him directly for this, “I don’t know if it’ll help. I– I want to, but it might make things worse. The last time I tried to help people, things didn’t end well.”

He looked between her and the kid, and gave Ahsoka a sad shrug. “It doesn’t get much worse than this.”

That pulled at something in Ahsoka’s chest, and she had to take a deep breath before gesturing to the floor where Nya had been sitting before. “Put her down.”

“I don’t–”

“Put her down. I won’t hurt her. Put her down.”

Nya, still in her father’s arms, leaned back so that she could rest a hand on his cheek and look deeply into his eyes. “Papa, it’s okay.” 

He took a second to consider her willingness, before setting her on the ground, where she sat cross-legged, and Ahsoka came down to join her. She felt strange, inhabiting a role she’d only witnessed from the other end before, but it also felt strangely right. She didn’t like that. It wasn’t supposed to feel right anymore. 

“Do you know anything about these abilities? How to use them? How to control them?”

Nya shook her head, and behind her, her father stepped forward. 

“There’s no one to ask, and even if there were I’d rather her not know it.”

At least he was smart enough to realize that. 

At least that meant there was one smart person in the room. 

Because Ahsoka was about to do something very, very stupid. 

With regret, with reluctance, and with struggle, Ahsoka opened herself back up to the Force. 

Only a little. Only enough to re-immerse herself with the being that surrounded her, but instantly it felt like a cool splash of water throughout her entire system. Like a full breath after a lifetime of shallow huffs. Ahsoka let her connection to the Force creep back into her system, and she hated how addictive it was. 

“What are you–” Nya’s father asked, before he flew back a few steps, repelled by Ahsoka’s will without her even meaning to. It came so easy, too easy, too openly and willingly. It would be so heartbreaking to shut it out again. 

She had taken for granted how beautiful the universe was when you could see the binds holding it together. She could feel the pulse of connection tying Nya and her father, could her the thrum of history running through the veins of the house. She could sense the wells of riches buried in the ores beneath the street, and she could hear the creatures writhing around in them. And, in front of her, Nya sat like a beacon, a bright white light that pulsed with untapped potential. 

Ahsoka was reminded of her days in the creche, of being so young and eager that anything seemed like the most important knowledge in the galaxy. She’d remembered contemplating for years how she would use her sabers, spent months with practice swords trying to develop a fighting style that suited her. 

She’d learned to use the Force to push her higher when she jumped, and she hadn’t stopped annoying the Master of the Temple with that knowledge since, jumping to the top bunk with ease or to the highest shelves in the kitchen, then crouching and refusing to come down. 

Ahsoka saw that in Nya, that ability to learn. That’s what made this hard. 

The man stumbled forward again, regaining his composure as best he could, “you’re– you’re one of–” but before he could finish, Ahsoka dove into the child’s mind. 

It was an uncomfortable thing, coming into the headspace of someone who wasn’t prepared for such a thing. Ahsoka didn’t want to give her warning, though, because that could lead to fear and anger and much more dangerous things. Besides, a young mind was malleable, and one that hadn’t been trained in the Temple as hers had was easy to access. Still, as she found herself inhabiting Nya’s headspace, she still felt guilt. 

Every person was different, inside and outside of their own heads. Most of the people that she’d grown up around had already built sturdy walls to protect themselves from intrusions, and occasionally there were those who would lower these walls just for her. 

But not Nya. Nya was an open book, willing and eager to move and accommodate Ahsoka’s presence. She could feel the young girl’s hope, her lack of knowledge of just how dangerous she really was, and above it all, her adoration for her father. It was sweet, and vaguely reminded Ahsoka of herself at that age. 

So, when she found the thread that hummed of the Force, that connected Nya with all the living things to a much greater degree than most others, Ahsoka could feel the reverberations of it in her own mind. She let their two strings twine together, combining and sharing secrets of the universe that only they knew. Ahsoka felt as Nya’s mind opened up to the possibilities, and with careful hands, Ahsoka wound these chords around and around and around. Tight around her palm, her wrist, like the bindings they were. Tighter and tighter so that they gnawed at her skin, threatened her very blood flow. More and more until her hands were all but immobile under their constraint. 

Then, with a swift motion, she pulled her hands apart, snapping the chord between them, and locking the girl out completely. 

Nya screamed. Ahsoka knew it was for the best. 

Because Ahsoka’s chords could reform, no matter how much she wished they wouldn’t. They had been trained and cared for long enough that they knew how to retain their shape even if they were broken. But this young girl didn’t have enough knowledge to understand what it would mean to recondition them to be whole again. 

And Nya would hate her, for taking away what, to her, was nothing more than a way to make her toys float and sense when her father was angrier than normal, but Ahsoka watched as she fell back into her father’s arms, as he took her and cooed to her, but looked to Ahsoka and understood. That is was right. That it was a sacrifice that needed to be made. 

And she felt bad, for tearing apart this poor girl’s potential from the foundations before she’d been able to build something truly great. But that was the only choice. Because it was that, it was death, or it was the Empire. Sacrifices had to be made. 

“Leave the planet. Don’t look back,” was all Ahsoka said before she dropped the tooka doll she’d forgotten she’d been holding and let herself out of the home, down the street and back to the room where her things were waiting. She’d have to scrape by until she was at the next planet, but she couldn’t risk staying. Not with this, and whoever had sent the bounty in the first place, out and about. She’d lay low and do more mechanic work until enough distance was put between her and this. And she’d hope nothing similar ever happened again. 

She’d spent enough time here, anyway. 

* * *

From high above, among the stars and Imperial blockades, a shadowed figure reigned. It stood, tall and daunting, against the windows of a control bridge, looking down to Ryloth below. As technicians made their way across the bay, careful to keep a distance from the still figure, a spark lit. 

Not for long, not very bright, but for one moment there was a flicker of something that had been lost long ago. 

He’d thought to death. Either a successful clone squadron or perhaps something even cruder. It was the only explanation for how she’d managed to remain out of their grasp for so long. Then again, so had Obi-Wan, who was somewhere out there living and suffering in his own hypocrisy. 

But he’d thought Ahsoka had been dead. It had been the only thing that made sense. 

Yet… yet…

Somewhere among the stars, Anakin Skywalker looked down at his domain and felt the faintest traces of a presence of someone who’d abandoned him a long time ago. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To quote the one true love of my life, Ykatrina Petrovna Zamolodchikova, H-E-A-R Bitches I am HERE!
> 
> Anyway, I know I haven't updated this in a while, so have nearly 7,000 words of me making myself upset. I'm on break, now, so chances are that updates will hopefully happen much faster. 
> 
> Hope you enjoyed! Let me know, and I missed writing this angsty nonsense! Happy holidays

**Author's Note:**

> So I've never written a chapter this long before but uhhhhh... I️ might try to keep that length for the next chapters in this fic. Realistically, that means that updates will not be quick.


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